Big East split all about football

RADNOR — In the spring of 2011, Villanova’s Board of Control was all set to vote on whether or not to move its football program from the FCS to the FBS. All the university needed was an invitation from the Big East and the board, according to sources, was prepared to make the leap.

But the invitation never came and a vote was never taken.

“I’m pleased we didn’t make that decision,” the Rev. Peter Donohue, Villanova’s president, said during a press conference following Villanova’s 75-65 basketball victory over Delaware Sunday.

If it had, Villanova would not be among the seven Catholic schools that voted to split from the Big East as a group Saturday to form an all-sports conference with basketball as its core sport.

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“We really don’t want to be just a basketball conference,” Villanova athletic director Vince Nicastro said. “We want to be nationally competitive and have national distinction across a number of sports. You’ve seen schools like Villanova, Georgetown and others being nationally competitive, being capable of winning national championships in different programs like cross country, lacrosse and soccer. We want to have a full array of national caliber programs when this thing gets up and running.”

That includes football, just not at the FBS level. That is dead.

“We’re committed to playing football at the highest level of the FCS,” Nicastro said.

Make no mistake about it. The decision by Villanova, DePaul, Georgetown, Marquette, Providence St. John’s and Seton Hall to file annulment papers with the Big East was about getting away from the ongoing conference realignment mess caused by football.

For the last two years, the league has been reshaped by football, not basketball. The final straw for the Big East’s Catholic cluster came last month, when Louisville announced it is headed to the ACC and Rutgers said it was going to the Big Ten. The Catholic schools saw the writing on the wall and that message said it was time to separate from the football schools move on and look out for No. 1 as a group.

“There was a concern on all of our part where the conference was heading and where basketball was playing a part in that conference,” Fr. Donohue said. “It seemed much more prevalent that the football schools seemed much more prevalent so we began to talk about a lot of possibilities. It came to this decision after a lot of conversations and a lot of decisions of what we needed to do and where we needed to place ourselves.”

And that is in a conference with basketball at its core, which ironically, is how the Big East got its start. The late Providence coach Dave Gavitt came up with the idea more than 30 years ago and saw his dream come to reality when the Big East was formed in 1979. Syracuse and Boston College were the only founding members that had football. The league didn’t sponsor the sport until 1990.

The conference was successful, and together, with basketball as its featured sport. The cracks started when the league decided it was time to try to reap some of the huge profits that are being doled out in football because of TV deals, conference championship games and too many bowls games to remember.

The schism began when Boston College announced it was leaving nearly a decade ago, followed quickly by Virginia Tech and Miami. It finally came apart when Pittsburgh and Syracuse announced they were headed for the ACC. The league stemmed the tide, briefly, by adding the likes of Temple, Boise State (for football next year), Houston, SMU, San Diego State, but it wasn’t enough to keep the conference together.

Once Notre Dame, Louisville and Rutgers decided to bolt, the Catholic or basketball schools realized it was time to act.

“The biggest thing for us is to control our destiny and control our future,” Nicastro said. “I think that was the overriding feature. We’re in a very unique time in intercollegiate athletics. As you all know there has been a lot of chaotic reorganization and consolidation in our business and we thought it was time to work as a group to control our destiny moving forward.”

No one knows where that will be. There’s still a lot to hash out, including who, if anyone, controls the right to the Big East name. The Catholic schools would like to keep it, but that’s one of the many things that have to be hashed out in the negotiation process or resolved by the lawyers.

Unlike their other departing Big East brethren, the Catholic schools do not have to pay an exit fee, thanks to a little provision in the bylaws the schools to leave the conference as a group without having to pay a penalty or exit fee.

The league, whatever it is called, also will have an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament, thanks to a provision in the NCAA bylaws which grants and automatic bid to a group of seven schools that have been together in the same league for at least five years.

There will be additions, Nicatro said so, saying that seven was not a good number for a conference. Which schools will be asked to join remains speculation at this points, but look for Xavier, Butler, Creighton, among others, to receive invitations.

Those offers are not exclusive to Catholic schools. The presidents want a league as diverse as possible, just one with basketball as the main attraction, not big-time football.

Jay Wright believes it will work.

“I know everyone is all in to be nationally prominent,” Wright said. “That is the key to this league.”